In 1893 the Metropolitan Asylums Board purchased 22 acres of land immediately southwest of its Fountain Hospital site in Tooting as the location for its last new infectious diseases hospital.

The Grove Fever Hospital was completed in 1896 but did not open until
1899. Its entrance in Tooting Grove was opposite the entrance to
the Fountain Hospital. The porter's lodge contained a waiting
room and a discharge room, where patients who were leaving could bathe
and change from their hospital garments to their own clothes. New
patients were admitted to a reception block before being assigned to a
ward. At the south side of the site, by Blackshaw Road, were
eight pavilion ward blocks for scarlet fever patients. The
pavilion blocks were placed so their north-south orientation maximised
the amount of sunlight and air; they were linked to each other and the
administration and laundry blocks by covered walkways. Each block
had two floors of wards (the upper floor had its own stairway from the
covered walkway). Each floor had a main ward of 20 beds, each
with a window each side of it, and a small side ward of 2 beds,
providing a total of 352 beds. North of the scarlet fever blocks
were six single-storey isolation blocks, two of which contained four
2-bedded wards. two with two 4-bedded wards and single rooms, and the
others with 6-bedded and 2-bedded wards. North of these were four
ward blocks with 112 beds for diphtheria and enteric fever patients.

To the east of the isolation blocks lay the administration block, with
the laundry to the south of it. Staff accommodation was in
several blocks at the eastern part of the site, which also contained
gardens and recreation grounds. The Medical Superintendent's
house was at the northwest corner of the site; the mortuary and medical
education blocks were at the northeast corner.

During WW1 the Hospital was requisitioned in 1916 by the War Office and
became the Grove Military Hospital with 550 beds, treating both
officers and other ranks. Sections of the Hospital were
designated for infectious diseases, TB of the lung, and dermatology
(scabies, venereal disease). The military hospital opened in
November 1916 and closed in September 1919. During its
operational lifetime, it had treated 2,499 officers and 13,459 enlisted
men.

In 1920 it became a fever hospital once more. In 1921 it had 537
beds. More staff accommodation was built at the southeast part of
the site.

In 1930 the LCC took over administrative control of the Hospital, when it had 582 beds.

In 1932, in a landmark clinical trial, Joseph Bramhall Ellison, a
physician on the staff,
discovered that providing vitamin A to children with measles reduced
their mortality by 58%. (The expected death rate from measles in
children aged up to five years old was 8-9%. Of Ellison's trial
group, 3.7% died.)

In 1935 a new Nurses' Home was built.

During WW2, as well as patients with infectious diseases, civilian
air-raid casualties were admitted. Several ward blocks were
damaged by bombs, which rendered 210 beds unusable. Of the
remaining 406 beds, 160 of the infectious diseases beds were used by TB
patients.

The Hospital joined the NHS in 1948 under the control of
the Wandsworth Hospital Group as the Grove Hospital; it had 408 beds. Soon after this the Ministry of
Health decided that St George's Hospital at Hyde Park Corner would be
rebuilt on the Grove and Fountain Hospital sites. The Grove
Hospital was requested by the Ministry to make 150 beds available
to St George's Hospital patients and to place nurses' accommodation and
ancillary buildings at the disposal of St George's.

In 1951 patients from St George's Hospital began to be admitted.
At the same time St James' Hospital in Balham was being rebuilt,
which meant the temporary closure of several wards. Staff from
Balham were transferred to the Grove Hospital site to open 50
beds there for their patients. The Supplies Office for the
Wandsworth Hospital Group was housed in an unused block at the Hospital.

In 1952 it was decided to discard the Hospital's own generator, which
was 50 years old and reaching the end of its end of its efficient
life, and to receive mains electricity from the London Electrical
Board. The wards were converted from DC to AC current, although
much of the Hospital remained on the old DC current, making it
necessary to install a mercury arc rectifier.

By 1954 responsibility for the Grove Hospital had been transferred from
the Wandsworth Hospital Group to the Board of Governors of St George's
Hospital. The Grove Hospital became the Tooting branch of St
George's Hospital. In 1955 it had 250 beds and, in 1957 228 beds
for general and infectious diseases patients. In 1958, when it
had 362 beds, the Grove Hospital was renamed St George's Hospital,
Tooting Branch.

In 1960 the Hospital had 374 beds for general and infectious diseases
cases, and this number had increased to 450 beds by 1975 (the St
George's Hospital group had 903 beds overall).

Services grew slowly on the site and it was not until 1973 that
building works for the new St George's Hospital at Tooting began in
earnest.

Present status (July 2008)

Most of the Grove Hospital buildings
were demolished in the 1970s, but two of the original ward blocks
survive, together with some of the nurses' accommodation at the
southeast part of the site.

The western main vehicle entrance to St George's Hospital in Cranmer
Terrace follows the original line of Tooting Grove. The Grove
Hospital would have been on the right and the Fountain on the left.The surviving ward blocks are now the Knightsbridge Wing, used for offices, wards and out-patient clinics.

The former nurses' accommodation still exists. Bronte House and its annexe are used by the Finance Directorate of the Hospital. Clare House contains offices and a Walk-In Clinic.